Bitter End
by RheaBay
Summary: Very angsty. WARNING: Character death, abuse, violence, language. Not for the faint-hearted. PLEASE READ AND REVIEW! Disclaimer: I own none of this, except the plot. It is the only thing in the wonderful Potterverse I can rightfully call my own.
1. A Background, An Explanation

**Authors note!! This is not for children's eyes. It is harsh, cruel, and morbid. That is my fair warning.**

**Disclaimer: I do not own them; I merely borrowed them for my evil intentions and cruel vision of a story. I own only the plot. Carry on.**

"Damn it woman, you look a mess! Clean yourself and fix dinner. Quickly"

Severus Snape said this last word quietly and with a hateful scowl to his wife of five years, Hermione Granger.

They never had a particularly happy marriage. In fact, they had been most miserable. Hermione had received the butt of his post traumatic war syndrome. He had turned even more spiteful and hateful after Harry Potter had told everyone that he, Severus Snape, was in fact in love with Lily Potter. He never got over the hatred towards Harry, and knowing he revealed his deepest darkest secret to Voldemort and the Death Eaters made him despise Harry even more.

And then the marriage law was enforced and his only choice was to marry the bookish know-it-all, Harry Potter's closest friend, Hermione Granger.

So this is where he was in life; depressed, unhappily married, and partially insane from loneliness. He was a very angry, spiteful man and he took it out on his wife, who had been nothing but devoted to him.

Hermione was not happy with the match at first, but she knew the true man he was; the one who loved and cared and protected. He was truly a hero to her, and she greatly respected him. She had told him on one occasion, and she even committed herself to trying to love him.

Memories of that night made her cringe.

That was the first night he hit her.

~~~~FLASHBACK~~~~

Severus lay in their marriage bed, naked, with his Slytherin green silk sheets draped lazily across his scarred chest. It had been a year since their marriage, and they did occasionally have not-so-meaningless sex. Hermione had fallen asleep after one of the most amazing experiences in bed with her husband. She had fallen in love with him that night. Hearing him whisper her name gently in her had sent shivers up her spine, and she shuddered at the thought of her potentially meaning something more to him than just a wife on documents, and a quick, easy fuck. She rolled over to lay her head on his chest and started stroking his chest lightly with her fingertips. He stiffened at the personal action. She looked up him.

"Severus,"

she whispered gently. He looked down at his wife, his obsidian eyes just as cold as ever. She shivered.

"Severus…I think,"

she stuttered to get the words out. He looked impatiently at her. She struggled to tell him quickly, knowing his temper.

"What I mean is…I know that this marriage was arranged, and that before we weren't particularly fond of the match…b-but I think…"

She closed her eyes for a minute to regain her composure. She looked back up into his eyes and whispered,

"I…I have fallen in love with you."

She never could have been prepared for what happened next. He went wild. She didn't know why. He ripped himself out of the sheets, his eyes raging with fury. He grabbed her bare arm, enough to bruise her on first contact. And then it happened.

He slapped her. Hard. With his right hand right across the left side of her face. She cried out, a tear leaking from her tightly shut eye, her face already burning red. He yelled. She didn't know what; he senses had all but gone, except for her feeling. She could feel every ounce of pain that shot through her. He flung her on the cold stone floor, him being much, much stronger than her. She fell directly on her knees and heard a pop. Agonizing pain screeched through her writhing body and she felt the bold trickle from her head, where she hit the post from the bed on the way down. He didn't care. She looked up at him, confused, hurt, praying he would take pity on her. He didn't. He shouted at her again. Then kicked her stomach. He kneeled down beside her to whisper in her ear. Cold, heart wrenching ice arrows for words reached her ear as he said,

"You'll never have my babies after that, you wretched excuse for a wife."

And with that he stalked away, slamming the door behind him, leaving his writhing wife naked, bleeding, and crying on the floor.

It had continued like this every so often for the next four years into their pathetic excuse for a marriage.

~~~~END FLASHBACK~~~~

Everyone knew what he did to her. It was evident when she would go out to the stores and such. But no one ever, ever said anything in fear of the ex-Death Eater and his vicious demeanor.

Harry had tried talking to her about it, but she simply refused to admit anything was going on and yelled at him when he suggested so. That had been two years ago. They had spoken only three times since that conversation.

And now today, he came home after up and leaving for three months. The first thing he did was yell at her.

No, first he hit her, and then yelled at her.

He walked in to find her scrubbing the floor, her hair in a wretched bun, dark circles under her eyes, and her skin as pale and sickly as his.

He didn't find that acceptable in a wife. And that is where we now find ourselves…

"Damn it woman, you look a mess! Clean yourself and fix dinner. Quickly"

"No."

She answered, getting up from the floor from the impact of the collision of his hand to her face. Her voice broke as she said that word, but she kept her fist balled and stared him straight in the eyes. She had decided that when he eventually killed her for standing up to him, she would at least die knowing she had not cowered from looking him in his lifeless eyes.

"What did you say to me, witch?"

He asked in a cold whisper, incredulousness dripping from his already sickening voice.

"I said,"

she stated louder, picking her bruised shoulders up to stand taller.

"no, Severus."

"What is the meaning of this? You will do as I say, do you hear me! I didn't think my being gone for three months would ruin you capability of discretion and obedience. Apparently, I was a fool to have thought so."

She held her ground, determined to tell him what he needed to know, for her own sake.

"Excuse me, _my Lord_, but I was unaware that your mere presence could deter the malign muggle disease that you and I both know as: cancer."

Her voice had not faltered once. She was as strong as she could be in this moment. But in this horrible, heart wrenching moment she continued.

"I'm leaving you Severus. I cannot live like this anymore, especially when I am slowly, painfully dying. I did not expect you to pity me, or even keep your filth ridden hands off me long enough to let me pack my things before I depart. So I have already transferred my belongings to where I will be staying. That is until two months…"

Here she faltered, tears welling in her eyes. She had never been one to fear death, in fact she prayed for it on a regular day basis, knowing that it would be far better than this life.

But still, the thought of leaving this earth without accomplishing nearly half the things she desired shattered her already broken, bruised heart.

He was not mildly bemused. Simply irritated.

"Where are you going now?" He asked bitterly.

"That is not for me to reveal. I will not have you follow me just to have me killed more quickly."

He chuckled at the thought of her thinking she was worth his time following. He spoke again.

"The where will you be in two months time, if it is not where you are going now?"

"By then, I will undoubtedly be in St. Mungo's, rapidly decaying as the tumor in my brain and left breast spreads."

He inhaled sharply, and then spoke, sneering at her in a manner that she knew said that he found her to be despicable.

"I always knew you were good for nothing Hermione Granger. Not even your miserable excuse for breasts could hold out. How pathetic you are."

She laughed a little.

"Severus…It is not I who am pathetic. Do you not see? CAN you not see? I have been bitterly in love with you for four years, and I have put up with this miserable life you've so selfishly dealt me. And now, as I stand before you dying the only thing you can think to say is how my breasts did not meet your standards? No, Severus Snape, I am not pathetic. I, at least, will not be alone when I die. That is a fate for you that only the gods could have so willingly provided for a depraved, heartless man like you."

He stood, shocked, his eyes menacingly glazed over as he started into her amber ones.

And then, with one final look at the man she loved, she turned rapidly on the spot and apparated, right out of his life forever.


	2. A Final Friend, A Final Dream

~~~~TWO MONTHS LATER~~~~

Two months later Hermione found herself exactly where she presumed she would be; dying in an uncomfortable bed in the cancer treatment center of St. Mungo's, with an impoverished heart for a man who never loved her. She had known this would be her fate, ever since the doctors informed her of the disease and how it was irrevocable, four pain staking months ago.

She had ended up living with harry and Ginny, who lovingly looked after her and immediately forgave her for her stubbornness and lashing out at them so many, many months ago. Harry could hardly believe his best friend was dying, right before his eyes. It had been especially hard for him to take, because his whole life he tried his best to prevent his friends, family, and the whole wizarding world from early deaths. But now it seemed, to him, that it was all for nothing. His best friend was dying. He wept openly in her arms when she apparated into his kitchen unexpectedly one night, disheveled and beaten. He cried for her, to her, with her. Their tears would not stop falling. And that is where Ginny had found them the next morning, Hermione in a brotherly embrace from Harry, slumped over the kitchen table. Ginny cried as well upon hearing the terrible news. Harry stayed home from work for two months, caring for her. She could not have asked for a better friend than him, and she tried endlessly to keep from waking him in the middle of the night when she would writhe in pain, and cry out. It took her a while to train her mouth to keep shut when she awoke with pain, either from the cancer or from a dream about him…No, even after she left him, he was all she thought about. He was always lingering subconsciously in her mind, both prevalent and not.

Her two months with the Potter's passed unbelievably fast, but she tried her best to be happy being with them, and truthfully, that was the happiest she could remember being in a long, long while. Yet, her thought still remained on him.

A week and a half into St. Mungo's, Hermione Jane Granger Snape had passed away. It had come easily for her. That night, she knew she would go. She decided on it. She told her nurse to let her go, and to let her slip away peacefully, dreaming in her sleep of her love.


	3. A Bitter End, A Bitter Tear

~~~~TWO DAYS LATER~~~~

"Hermione Jane Granger Snape was a loyal friend, a trustworthy companion, a loving person, and without a doubt the smartest witch of her age, a bookworm to be exact. She loved to read. It was her escape from reality, and sometimes her wake up call for reality. She never once failed me, and always, always had the answers to everything, whether is be knowing where to find it in a book, or simply plucking it from the various facts stored in her marvelous mind. She always let me copy her homework, or at least write the introduction to our essays, with the greatest finesse I've ever seen. She was my best friend, right until the very end, and still is. Hermione will forever be in my heart, and I know her spirit lingers on in every one of those she so graciously blessed with her life." Harry Potter paused to wipe the tears flowing from his eyes. He looked up, shaking, as he slowly said, " 'Mione, I love you and miss you." He slowly walked away from the podium set up on the platform of the Great Hall to take his seat as his wife caressed his arm reassuringly.

He turned slowly and closed his tear brimmed eyes to sit, but not before he saw unmistakable tear drop from the long, crooked nose behind a great column, all the way at the end of the hall.

**A/N – Hey! Please review. I couldn't get this little plot bunny to stop hoppin around in my head. Hope this wasn't too terrible violent.**

**See, I have written many Severus' before. Lustful Severus, Beautiful Severus, Hurt Severus, Dead Severus, but never have I written an intentionally cruel, heartless Severus, so I thought I might mix it up a little.**

**I hope you enjoyed this as thoroughly as possible.**

**I know, I hate to picture our beloved Severus like this, but he just wouldn't leave my head and kept pounding on it til I let him out. A Severus pounding on one's head along with plot bunnies a-hoppin is a sure way to catch a raging head ache and become irritable. So, this is the result. I am rather pleased with it if I do say so myself. Hope you are too. Please review!!! (I take very well to compliments And constructive criticism!)**

**Cheers!**

**~RB**


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